Never Again
by SherlockianQueen
Summary: One night Sherlock has a bad PTSD dream about his time in Serbia. When John comes in to comfort him, he ends up staying the night. This is the start of a new relationship between them.


"реци ми шта знаш!" (Tell me what you know!)

The men in his cell have been hitting Sherlock for what feels like hours with a belt. The welts on his back sting with a pain so incredible that it blocks nearly every other thought from his mind.

"реци ми шта знаш!"

This particular torturer Sherlock felt was one of the best and worst for different reasons. He was less imaginative with the pain than most of the others which was an obvious plus, but what wasn't so good was that he was endlessly boring. _Late twenties, lives with a close family member, likely his mother, got this job through family connections and not his intelligence.  
_

"Не знам ништа!" (I don't know anything!) Sherlock yelled in Serbian. It was always the same with this torturer, a back and fourth of _'Tell me what you know!' _and_ 'I don't know anything!'. _The guy probably got the lines off of a TV show.

The steal door creaks open, and for a second Sherlock thinks that the torturer was leaving, and that he'll get a break. His hopes are crushed with cruel force when he sees who is standing in the doorway.

This man, unfortunately, is no idiot. Sherlock can read almost as little about him as he can about Irene Adler, and what he can read is useless information like what he had for breakfast this morning. His methods of torture are inhumane and merciless, cold-blooded and heartless. Three weeks ago it was oxygen deprivation, two weeks ago it was playing an ultra high pitched noise through headphones for five days, and last week it was carving words into his back. He is yet to find out what the words were, but something tells him that they're not exactly kind.

The detective can feel the icy wind from the glassless but barred window frame running over his welts on his back and the raw skin on his wrists from the handcuffs. It is a small mercy in his life which he is ever so grateful for. He hasn't showered in weeks; he has a beard that touches his chest; and matted hair down to his shoulders. He is grateful for anything that eases his suffering in this small corner of hell.

The man that was standing in the doorway comes in.

"Одлази, Тодор, ред је да га испитам. Не радите то како треба." (Go away, Todor, it is my turn to question him. You aren't doing it right) the other torturer ordered. With a huff the idiot -Todor- left the room. The new torturer (Sherlock thinks his surname is Petrović, but can't be sure) walks towards him.

Sherlock's heart starts to beat faster, and he pulls on the chains hopelessly in a futile and pathetic attempt at getting away from Petrović. The torturer laughs at his actions and brings a stool to sit next to him.

"Не бојте се, то вам неће помоћи. Ако ми тренутно не кажете који су вам планови, ја ћу вам то сипати по леђима. Да ли је то разумљиво?" (Now don't be afraid, it won't help you. Unless you tell me the plans right now, I'll pour this on your back. Is that understood?) Petrović said in a quiet voice. Midway through he had taken something that looked like a jam jar filled with a clear liquid and waved it in front of Sherlock's eyes.

He took off the lid and waved it in front of Sherlock's nose. "Можете ли погодити шта је ово?" (Can you guess what this is?)

Sherlock can definitely guess what it is. A few seconds after it is waved under his nose he feels a familiar burning in his eyes, nostrils, and lungs. Acid. And from the putrid smell he assumes it's Sulphuric acid, Ph 2.75.

He groans in anticipation of how horrible this would be. To his dismay he realises that he's shaking, and not from the cold.

"Упозорио сам те ..." (I warned you...)

As soon as the acid touches his skin on the newly formed lacerations he screams. And screams. And screams. It is gushing all over his back, on the words, on the bruises, on the cuts, on everything. He has never known such terrible and horrific pain before in his life.

In the distance, through the pain, he thinks he hears someone. The voice gets louder, and the sound clearer. He thinks he hears his name sound over and over again. _That's weird, no-one here knows his name._

Gradually the pain retreats from excruciating to bearable. _I must be dying_, he thinks. Sherlock feels someone shaking his shoulder.

"Sherlock! Sherlock please wake up! Please!" John begs.

With a startled gasp Sherlock finally wakes up from his all-consuming nightmare. He flinches away from John's hands on his shoulders. He runs his hands over his wrists, arms, back, and ankles. When he realises that he is sitting on his bed and not chained up with acid burning through his skin he recites the same things he always does when he has a nightmare.

"My name is Sherlock Holmes. I am the worlds only Consulting Detective. My birthday is the sixth of January, and I turned 37 this year. I live in London at 221b Baker Street, and I am there now. I live with John Watson. He is not a threat. He is kind. Nobody will hurt me or John. My name is Sherlock Holmes..." he repeats these eight sentences a few times before opening his eyes again.

John is sitting on the side of his bed watching him through wet eyes.

"You were crying." Sherlock stated.

"So were you." John replied. Sherlock brought his hands up to his eyes and felt that they were indeed wet. Embarrassment makes his cheeks tinge with pink.

"Can I touch you?" John asks. Sherlock nods and allows John to take his hands in his own.

"Do you want to talk about it?" the Detective thinks about it for a minute before nodding his head.

"During my time away I wasn't exactly on holiday. I made a stupid mistake a year and a half in to the mission, which led to me getting captured in Serbia. They held me in a cell for a month, and then they transported me to another base. Mycroft tried to rescue me on the journey, but unfortunately failed. I was kept and tortured there for four months."

All of John's fears have now been confirmed. He had treated him like shit when he returned, beaten him to a pulp several times on the first night and avoided him afterwards. What if he had been tortured not long before he had hit him? How much pain had he caused him?

"Mycroft rescued me at the end of the fourth month and brought me back to London. I spent two weeks recovering from the worst of my injuries and getting surgery on my ribs before coming back to see you again. If it is okay with you I would rather not go into too much detail about how they tortured me, but you may see my scars if you like."

John feels that he has to see the scars now, or he'll forever wonder about what lies beneath the silk shirts he's so fond of wearing. When he had heard Sherlock shouting in another language in the middle of the night he assumed he was just yelling at Mycroft on the phone, but he ran down stairs when he started screaming as if in agony. He had spent five minutes trying to wake him up, begging him to wake up, and when Sherlock finally did the terror in his eyes killed him inside.

"Okay." John answered Sherlock's question.

The Detective sat up in bed and turned on his bedroom lamp. He crossed his arms over the black T-shirt he was wearing, took a deep breath and brought it up over his head.

From the front Sherlock looked like an average bloke, except for being a bit skinnier and more muscled. Then he lay back down on the bed and turned over so the whole of his back down to the hem of his shorts were visible.

The blogger couldn't help the startled gasp that escaped him when he saw Sherlock's back. It was a criss-cross patchwork of scars. There were scars from lacerations, from what looked like acid burns, and the same word carved over and over again, '**_наказа_**'.

"What do the words mean, Sherlock?"

"Oh, '_nakaza_'? That means freak in Serbian."

A phenomenal amount of anger aimed at whoever did this to him sweeps through John. "Please tell me that the people who did this to you are dead Sherlock, or I'll kill them. God help them if they're still alive, for I guarantee you that they won't be for much longer."

"They're dead. Mycroft shot them all after I was safe. It was the most emotional I've ever seen him since he was a child."

"Can I touch you? It's okay if you don't want me to." John asks

"I don't mind." Sherlock replies.

John runs his fingers gently over the scars. He had seen soldiers with similar wounds in Afghanistan, but none of them had writing marked into them. This seemed so much more personal.

"I should let you sleep." John says, about to stand up.

"No!" Sherlock said forcefully. Looking a little bit embarrassed he added, "Would you mind staying a bit longer?"

Understanding that what Sherlock means to say is _would you please stay with me tonight_, John walks around to the other side of the bed and gets in.

"People might talk." Sherlock said.

"I'm sorry?"

"Two grown men, sleeping in the same bed together, one of them half-naked? People are going to talk."

John chuckles to himself. A younger him would have cared deeply about what people might think of what he's doing, but events in the last few years have shown him just how little it matters in the grand scheme of things. And besides, now he's not totally against taking another step in his relationship with Sherlock.

To show the Detective just how little he cares, he comes up close to Sherlock and puts his arms around him. After a moments hesitation Sherlock nestles into John's chest. Just before they fall asleep, John whispers "I'm so glad you came back," and plants a kiss on the top of the half-naked detective's head.

* * *

Over the next few months, John begins to sleep in Sherlock's bed a lot more often. After a while he brings his clothes downstairs into Sherlock's room, as well as a few of his possessions. John stops dating, and Sherlock sleeps a lot more often. When they go out on their first date and have sex for the first time, neither of them have ever been happier.

Nine months after they first share a bed, Sherlock proposes at a crime scene in front of the whole of Scotland Yard. Despite it being completely inappropriate, John says yes, and three months later they're married.

John makes a vow to himself that no-one will ever hurt Sherlock in that way ever again. He would take his place in a second if he had to.

He always tells Sherlock when he wakes up from a bad PTSD dream, "Never again."

**A/N:**

**Thank you so much for reading! Please tell me what you think and how I can improve my writing.**

**-Irena. N**


End file.
